


Holidays with the Hornes

by AudreyxxHorne



Series: Glimpses: Audrey Horne Short Stories [4]
Category: Twin Peaks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-16 09:54:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13051644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AudreyxxHorne/pseuds/AudreyxxHorne
Summary: Audrey reflects on Christmases of the past and wonders what the new year will bring.





	Holidays with the Hornes

_When you live your life as an outcast, you get used to constantly feeling as if you're looking in on the scenery that is other people's lives._

* * *

 

It had all started on one Thanksgiving when Audrey had accidentally pushed Johnny down the stairs when they were playing. A mere toddler at the time, she didn't understand why her mother cursed her for being such a problem child and why her father ignored her when she asked what that meant. Christmas was cancelled that year and strange people started coming into the suddenly too big house to talk to Johnny. 

Another year, Audrey remembered her father excusing himself in the middle of lunch and returning deep into the night smelling of a perfume that certainly didn't belong to her mother. Suddenly, the gifts she had received earlier in the day seemed tacky and the food she had eaten tasted rotten. That was the beginning of her foray into cynicism regarding her family. 

The older she got, the less she was able to tolerate the fakery. On a good day, her parents would ignore each other, did they really believe that she was so stupid that she believed that everything was suddenly okay for one day of the year? Yet despite their fakery between themselves, they could still hardly pretend to care about Audrey at all. The gifts never won her over, she would have traded them all for a hug or even a reassurance that she wasn't the worst thing to have ever happened to them. 

* * *

 

Audrey had turned 18 this year. 18 had always felt like a magical number that felt so vast and far away when she was a child. Now that 18 had come, she was disappointed that things hadn't suddenly changed overnight. Part of her had always wished that when she became an adult, her family would finally start seeing her as an equal. No such luck. There was no knight in shining armour that she had wished for either and certainly no glorious steed waiting to whisk her away from the town that felt smaller every day.

Christmas was still lonely and as the day drew to a close, she watched the snow fall from her bedroom window as she indulged in a quiet cigarette. Was it this lonely for others? Donna was probably having the time of her life with her perfect family and was likely cosied up in bed getting ready for another day of being untouchable. It was hard not to feel bitter when others judged her so harshly, accusing her of just being a spoiled brat. Nobody seemed to understand that all she had ever wanted in life was to feel loved. _That_ was the real reason why she envied Donna and even Laura, but to a lesser degree. Audrey could tell that Laura's life was far from perfect, but she still had an army of people who would do anything for her. For better or worse, Audrey had accepted long ago that she had to stand up for herself because nobody else was going to anytime soon. 

As she let the comforting smoke hit her lungs, she visualised the bitterness melting away. Letting her thoughts turn to what the new year may bring... she could have sworn that she felt change in the air but she wasn't able to discern whether it was light or dark. Perhaps like most things in life it would be neither, but rather a muddy grey in between like the colour of snow when people had stepped in it too much. Nothing stayed pure for long, did it? 


End file.
